Burning Books

The Nazi burning of the books in 1933 was one of the most infamous political spectacles of the twentieth century. In Berlin and all over Germany, Nazi officials and students organized elaborate parades and bonfires to mark their embrace of Hitler's new government. Book burning has since become the symbol of any oppressive regime, and a modern taboo. As Heinrich Heine is often quoted: 'Where one burns books, one will soon burn people'. This original and provocative new work examines the impact of these fires, concentrating on the years between the Nazi outrages and the publication of Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451 in 1953, a period in which book burning took hold of the popular imagination. Much more than simply the study of a single shocking event, Burning Books explores how deeply embedded the myths of book burning have become in our cultural and literary history, and illustrates the enduring appeal of a great cleansing bonfire.

Author: M. Fishburn
Publisher: Palgrave MacMillan
Published: 06/01/2008
Pages: 221
Binding Type: Hardcover
Weight: 1.01lbs
Size: 8.72h x 5.79w x 0.89d
ISBN: 9780230553286

Review Citation(s):
Choice 07/01/2009

About the Author
MATTHEW FISHBURN is a bookseller with Hordern House Rare Books in Sydney, Australia. He has taught at the University of Sydney and the University of Western Sydney. Together with Mark Tewfik, he is currently working on a book investigating the graffiti written on bombs during the Second World War. This is his first book.